Benjamin Balthaser

Beyond Tucker Carlson’s long track record of odious & reactionary views, the danger of promoting his "anti Zionism" is that it implies Palestinian, Jewish, queer, working class, Black critical voices are not worth as much; their critiques are somehow either less relevant or perhaps just, old news.

That is, we need to read this as another shot at liberal jurisprudence since the new deal - that took civil liberties seriously and left economic reforms and policy to politicians

I think it’s all of a piece: new deal legal reform (Caroline Products footnote) drew a distinction btw economic policy and civil rights and liberties - this court is turning this upside down

SCOTUS: fascism is cool, but don’t you dare raise taxes on our iphones

Yes they are running on v thin margins

“If you want to read Toni Morrison go to a private college” Indiana governor Mitch Daniels once said.

It’s just called “privatization” — and there was nothing accidental about destroying public universities

Yes probably but why would you

ChatGPT, did ChatGPT write this?

Benjamin Balthaser (@blbalthaser) I listened to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's comments at the Munich Security Conference (it wasn't a speech as it seems to be reported on, but rather a roundtable w a pro-EU right-wing German politician f...

Some thoughts about AOC’s comments at the Munich Security Conference on the strengths and limits of popular progressive anti-imperialist thought in this conjuncture substack.com/@blbalthaser...

UnitedHealth uses AI model with 90% error rate to deny care, lawsuit alleges For the largest health insurer in the US, AI's error rate is like a feature, not a bug.

"why are you against progress" I yell confidently as my sloppily-implemented algorithms prematurely murder your grandma

RFK was not a mvt leader but a politician; as for King perhaps no single inheritor but among ppl who were organizing and mobilizing progressive Black communities Palestine solidarity I think emerged as commonsense

lol

Btw Jesse Jackson and Rustin I might who carried the torch fwd of King’s legacy?

Anti left politics?

Liberal progress and national continuity narratives are so weird. I just heard someone on NPR say Jesse Jackson’s politics were “ahead of their time” bc they “presciently looked to the kind of populism we see today…with Donald Trump”

Rev. Jackson’s Role in Arab American Empowerment — James Zogby Forty years ago, I was at an Arab American dinner event with Rev. Jesse Jackson when he leaned over and said to me, “I’m running for President and I want you to join my campaign staff.”  My immediate ...

A lot of ink has been spilled about MLK’s support for Israel. Jesse Jackson, King’s confident, was the first political figure to bring the Palestinian struggle to the center of the Democratic Party in the 1980s. One can only assume King would followed suit jameszogby.com/washingtonwa...

Why do I keep hearing “thats my purse; I don’t know you!”

True

I am glad the Clintons keep reminding us of the Democratic Party complicity in constructing the carceral deportation machine

Every Sunday should be socialist Sunday

Red 🫡

Socialism is red; Democrats are blue: I believe in the former bc latter will not protect you

(Someone objected to my earlier scatalogical version; here is the NPR take)

That is the correct response

Socialism is red; Democrats are blue: I believe in the former bc latter are useless doo-doo

Epstein and the Capitalist Conspiracy Podcast Episode · On the Nose · 02/12/2026 · 41m

podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/o...

Klein notes how the SV/finance turn toward eugenics, fascism, rent seeking is both personally felt (me too, “woke” HR depts) & also conjunctural: fascism & rent seeking are the political economy of capitalism on a heating, colonized, unequal planet: the two form a discursive & political unity

We deployed a high power laser to shoot down a weaponized cartel fentanyl drone invasion which turned out to be a party balloon is far-right politics in one story

You love to see it

unions are the most important first amendment organizations for working ppl

Immigration Court Drops Case Against Tufts Student Rumeysa Ozturk The Turkish national had been arrested by plainclothes federal officers outside her apartment.

An immigration court dropped its case against Turkish graduate student Rumeysa Ozturk, a little less than a year after federal agents arrested her on a street near Tufts University